Nothing Like the Sun
by PepperjackCandy
Summary: Clark doesn't 'get' poetry. A little slashy around the edges (CLex). Written July 2002. Posted post-Nocturne


Title: Nothing Like the Sun  
Author: PepperjackCandy  
Rating: PG13  
Pairing: Clark/Lex  
Category: General/Drama/Romance/Literature  
Spoilers for: Nothing.  
Set During First Season  
  
Disclaimer: I own nothing Smallville-related, or related in any other way to Clark Kent, Superman or any of the various creations of the wonderful folks at DC Comics.   
  
Feedback: Always welcome, either by e-mail or using the review system at fanfiction.net.   
  
A/N: I used to not "get" poetry, but as time went by, I've acquired a number of favorite poems. Here are *some* of them, but not nearly all.  
  
Just as an FYI, the writing music for this was the album that started it in the first place, well, the liner notes for it at any rate (http://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/2832/nlts1.html), Sting's "Nothing Like the Sun."  
  
========  
  
After his private meeting with his English teacher, Clark walked through town to the Beanery, where Chloe and Pete were waiting for him.  
  
"So?" Chloe asked as he joined them at a table for four. "How'd it go?"  
  
"I told her that I didn't really 'get' poetry, and asked her how I can possibly write about it."  
  
"Is this seat taken?" Lex, who had just arrived himself, indicated the fourth, empty, chair at the table.  
  
The other three looked at each other and Clark spoke for all of them. "No. You're welcome to join us."  
  
Lex smiled and sat down. "So, what are we talking about?"  
  
"Clark's English term paper." Pete said.  
  
Lex, without comment, made a face.  
  
"You were going to tell us Mrs. Boerman's solution?" Chloe prompted.  
  
"Yeah. She and I talked, and basically, she told me that poetry is personal. That poems are supposed to touch people, or say things that they relate to. So she suggested that I ask my friends and family what their favorite poem is and why."  
  
"And family?" Pete asked. "Somehow, your dad doesn't strike me as the poetry type."  
  
Clark shrugged. "I'll ask him anyhow. If he doesn't have one, I'll just say so in my paper. So, who wants to go first? Lex?"  
  
Lex's eyes widened, like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. "No." He shook his head. "I couldn't . . . it's *too* personal."   
"All right." Clark said. "How about you, Pete?"  
  
"Can I get away with the 'too personal' thing, too?"  
  
Clark and Chloe both shook their heads. "Nope." Clark said.  
  
Pete silently appealed to Lex.   
  
"Sorry. Wish I could help. But it's out of my hands." Lex said with false regret.  
  
Pete sighed. "All right. But I don't know the title or who wrote it or anything. It's that one that ends with,   
  
_The woods are lovely, dark and deep.  
But I have promises to keep,  
And miles to go before I sleep,  
And miles to go before I sleep._"  
  
"'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.' Robert Frost." Chloe provided.  
  
"Really?"  
  
Chloe nodded, taking a sip of her coffee.  
  
"So, why that one, Pete?"  
  
"Um, well, it's really, you know, pretty, with talk about snow and things. And it was used on an episode of Roswell. I can still hear Liz quoting it."  
  
"Ugh. The Shiri Appleby thing again." Chloe rolled her eyes. "Did she bat those big brown eyes while she was quotink it?"  
  
"Hey!" Pete responded, affronted. "I don't insult your hunk of the week."  
  
Lex interrupted the bickering pair. "I bet I can guess yours, Chloe." He glanced over to where Lana was sitting with Whitney, their heads close together as they talked. "Song of One of the Girls by Dorothy Parker."  
  
"Shows how much you know, smart guy." Chloe stuck her tongue out at him. "It's Unfortunate Coincidence."  
  
Lex snorted indelicately.  
  
"Would someone mind explaining for the rest of us?" Pete asked.   
  
"_By the time you swear you're his,  
Shivering and sighing,  
And he vows his passion is  
Infinite, undying -  
Lady, make a note of this:  
One of you is lying._" Chloe quoted.  
  
"Cynical." Clark nodded with mock approval.  
  
"Yep. Well, with my romantic history, how can I help it? I mean, the one guy I can attract doesn't call me back until *after* he's been turned into some kind of heat-sucking monster and just wants me for my body temperature." Chloe pouted.  
  
Now Clark felt bad. He wanted to know why his friends' favorite poems were their favorites, but hadn't really comprehended that when asking for something personal, that sometimes it would really be *personal*.  
  
Lex attempted to break the tension that had descended on the table at Chloe's discomfort. "This ought to be good for a laugh." He whispered to Clark.  
  
"Lana!" He called across the café.  
  
Lana looked up from the homework she was working on.   
  
Lex indicated with a jerk of his head for her to join them.  
  
She whispered something to Whitney and then walked over to the table where the quartet sat. "Yes?"  
  
"What's your favorite poem?"  
  
Lana smiled beatifically. "That's easy. It's one of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's sonnets. I used to stay up nights reading it until I had it memorized.  
  
_If thou must love me, let it be for nought  
Except for love's sake only. Do not say  
'I love her for her smile--her look--her way  
Of speaking gently,--for a trick of thought  
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought  
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day'--  
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may  
Be changed, or change for thee,--and love, so wrought,  
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for  
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry,--  
A creature might forget to weep, who bore  
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby !  
But love me for love's sake, that evermore  
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity._"  
  
The whole time, she kept her eyes focused on Whitney, who watched her steadily. As the couple communed silently, Whitney's worship of Lana, and hers of him, became obvious to everyone in the room.  
  
Witnessing this silent exchange, Clark quietly gave up on Lana forever.  
  
"Why?" Chloe asked, her voice breaking.  
  
"Pardon me?"  
  
"Why is that your favorite?"  
  
"Because, shouldn't that be the way we're all loved, just because?" Lana asked simply. "It's what I've always wanted, and what I've found with Whitney." She shrugged lightly.  
  
"Thank you, Lana." Lex said quietly, his eyes dropping from her face, to the back of Clark's head.  
  
After Lana left the table and Clark finished making his notes, the four friends sat silently for a long while, absorbing what Lana had said. Finally, Clark stood. "Well, if I'm going to get this paper done in time, I'd better get to the 'family' part of friends and family. I'll see you all tomorrow." He turned and left the table.  
  
As he headed towards home on foot, he heard Lex's voice behind him. "Clark! Hold on a second."  
  
Clark wanted to stop for Lex, but after that display over Lana in the Beanery, he also wanted to get as far away from him as he could, so he slowed down, but didn't stop, figuring that if Lex really wanted to talk to him, he would catch up.  
  
Evidently, Lex really wanted to talk, because soon he heard Lex's footfalls right behind him. "At least you slowed down a little," the mogul panted.  
  
"What do you want, Lex?" Clark asked, more sharply than he intended.  
  
"I wanted to apologize. I know that must have hurt back there, with Lana."  
  
Clark sighed and shrugged. "I guess I've known that she and Whitney belonged together for a while. I just didn't want to admit it."  
  
They walked on for a while in silence. "Do you want a ride home?" Lex asked.  
  
Clark shrugged again. "I don't want to take you out of your way."  
  
Lex snorted. "Where do you think I have to go? You think my drafty old castle misses me?"  
  
Together they walked to Lex's car.   
  
When they got to the Kent family farm, Clark asked, "You want to come in? You can help me with my paper."  
  
Lex shook his head. "I'm sure your parents wouldn't appreciate me hanging around while they talk about their innermost feelings."  
  
Clark chuckled. "So, you can hang out in the loft while I ask them privately."  
  
Lex really didn't want to go home to his empty castle, so he caved quickly. "You win. I've got some work with me that I can catch up on anywhere."  
  
They got out of the car, Lex bearing his briefcase, Clark his bookbag. After Clark had Lex comfortably installed in the loft, he went in search of his father.  
  
He caught up with Jonathan in one of the outlying fields. "Dad!"   
  
"Hi, son. You come out to help your old man?"  
  
"Actually, no. I was hoping you could help me."  
  
"Oh?" Jonathan mopped his brow with a rag from his pocket.  
  
"It's for English. I'm supposed to find out what my family and friends' favorite poems are and why. You don't have a favorite poem, do you?"  
  
Jonathan smiled wryly. "Actually, I do. It helped me make up my mind when I had to decide between finishing college and taking over the farm after your grandfather died."  
  
"Really?"  
  
Jonathan nodded. "Robert Frost's 'The Road Not Taken.'"   
  
"But . . . didn't you take the road more traveled? I mean, you did what everyone else in your class must have done, gone to work on the family farm."  
  
"Ah." Jonathan grinned. "But I did take the road less traveled. I did what I felt was right, not what everyone else wanted me to do."  
  
Father and son shared a smile, Clark realizing that he understood his dad a lot better than he had before.  
  
Then he moved on to the house, where he found Martha cooking dinner. "Hi, baby." Martha smiled.  
  
"Hi, Mom."  
  
"Did I see Lex's car outside? Does he want to stay for dinner?"  
  
Clark shrugged. "I'll ask him. But, actually, I had a question for you. You were an English major in college. What's your favorite poem?"  
  
"What brought this on?"  
  
"It's my English term paper. I'm supposed to ask my friends and family what their favorite poems are and why."  
  
Martha smiled. "Sounds like fun. Well, mine is one of Shakespeare's sonnets. Number 130:  
  
_My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;  
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;  
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;  
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.  
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,  
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;  
And in some perfumes is there more delight  
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.  
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know  
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;  
I grant I never saw a goddess go;  
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:  
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare  
As any she belied with false compare._"  
  
"Well, that certainly wasn't very romantic." Clark responded, unimpressed.  
  
"Then you don't see what I see in the poem. I hear it saying that all of those idealized notions about what love is are nothing in comparison to what love really is."  
  
Clark thought for a moment, realizing how idealized his view of Lana had been, and how he'd never really seen her for who she was. "That makes sense."  
  
Lex stayed for dinner, and afterwards, as Clark walked him to his car, Clark asked, "Can I make one more bid to hear your favorite poem? I promise I won't put it in my paper, if you don't want, but I really would like to know."  
  
"You won't? Do you promise?"  
  
Clark nodded. "Of course."  
  
"You see, the day you saved me at the bridge, my favorite poem sort of . . . changed."  
  
"Oh?"  
  
There, by the light of the full moon above, Lex said, "It's not a whole poem, either. Just part of one. The final stanza, actually:  
  
_Thus much and more; and yet thou lov'st me not,  
And never wilt! Love dwells not in our will.  
Nor can I blame thee, though it be my lot  
To strongly, wrongly, vainly love thee still._"  
  
And Clark saw something in Lex's eyes. Something that had always been there, but that he'd been too wrapped up in fantasies of Lana to notice before. Love.  
  
And then Clark realized the possibility. The possibility that he could find the kind of love that Lana and Whitney had. That his parents shared. The kind that didn't rely on appearance and expectation, but was simply two people, their lives, their souls twining around each other into eternity.  
  
But.  
  
But it was a warm night, the moon was full, and Lex had just declared his love. What if Clark was just getting carried away by the romance of it all?  
  
And what if he wasn't? If he wasn't, the feeling would still be there tomorrow. And the next day. And Clark watched Lex get into his car and drive away, knowing that whatever the future held would wait for him to catch up with it.  
  
==========   
  
Chloe - Unfortunate Coincidence (you can also find Song of One of the Girls at this site):  
  
http://www.suck-my-big.org/blah/  
  
Jonathan - The Road Not Taken  
Pete - Stopping by Woods. . .  
  
http://www.robertfrost.org/body.html  
  
Lana - Sonnets from the Portuguese 14  
  
http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/rp/poems/brwnlz5c.html  
  
Lex - Final stanza of Love and Death:  
  
http://www.saqnet.co.uk/users/kuranda/poetry_frame.htm  
  
Martha - Sonnet 130  
PJC - Sonnet 116  
  
http://www.theplays.org/sonnets/ 


End file.
